


His Place in the Pack

by IndraraSkye



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Derek Hale Rocks, Injured Stiles, Insecure Stiles Stilinski, M/M, Pack 1 and Pack 2 are both just fine and together thank you, Post canon-typical violence, Pre-relationship Sterek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-23
Updated: 2017-01-23
Packaged: 2018-09-19 08:26:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9430052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IndraraSkye/pseuds/IndraraSkye
Summary: Stiles is injured in a fight, again, but knows that the rest of the pack has to be accounted for and put to rights before he can worry about himself. He knows his place in the pack. Derek has other ideas.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MidnightThoughts](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MidnightThoughts/gifts).



> Midnight Thoughts prompted injured, insecure Stiles after a fight and Derek had to take care of him. This is the result. I hope somebody enjoys it!

“Everybody still alive?” Scott called out, picking himself up off the ground. Stiles lay where he was, attempting to take a mental inventory. The bells ringing and the cannons going off in his ears was not helping this process. He shook his head to clear his hearing, which in hindsight was not a smart move. The ringing just got louder, but now the world was spinning around him. His eyes were closed, but the world was spinning around him all the same. This was probably not good. He took in a deep breath, which, as it turned out, was also not the brightest move in the world. His chest rattled and he felt like he was choking on fluid and air. Shallow breaths it was. 

“Did anyone get the number of that damned…whatever it was?” Lydia’s voice sounded shaky and higher than normal, but still there. She was still there. Stiles exhaled slowly, the breath rasping through his throat like whiskey coming back up. He was going to have to open his eyes. The pack needed him. He wanted to just lay there and slowly merge with the earth underneath him, but the pack needed him. His right ankle throbbed and pulsed out of time with his heartbeat, but the damn pack needed him. He opened his eyes slowly. 

In front of him, Derek lay on his stomach, his head at an odd angle and his face to Stiles. His eyes were still closed. The vegetation on the forest floor swayed slightly in front of his face, so at least he was still breathing. Stiles sighed in relief, then winced as his chest burned and constricted with the breath.

“Sound off,” Stiles rasped. “I need to hear that everybody’s alive and mobile.”

“Scott’s up,” Scott called out. Of course Scott was up. Scott was always up. The damn dude never went down. It was freaky.

“Lydia’s…alive,” his favorite banshee announced. That’s about what he’d deduced based on the state of her voice. She’d need some hugs and Hello Kitty band-aids when nobody was looking.

“Isaac’s mostly well.” Isaac’s voice carried anxiety, which Stiles didn’t like. Isaac anxious meant that Allison was probably not well, and if Allison was not well, Isaac was going to need all sorts of attention. He fought with the need to throw a tantrum about the amount of energy this pack was going to need from him after this incident. 

“Allison will make it.” Allison’s teeth were gritted. Stiles could hear it. Isaac was going to need all sorts of attention. Allison was probably going to need an Ace bandage and a shot of whiskey and she’d be good to go. She might need a strip of gauze. 

“Kira’s not mobile, but she’ll get over it.” Stiles never understood how the kitsune always sounded so cheerful. He wondered how bad she actually was. He hoped Deaton had somehow been alerted that this had gone down.

“Boyd? Erica? You guys still with us?” Stiles called out. If he kept calling out questions, he wouldn’t have to move as soon. 

Muffled grunts and groans served as responses. Stiles turned his neck slowly, looking around for Scott. “Scott! Check on Boyd and Erica, will you?”

“Anyone have a location on Derek?” That was Peter’s rough voice. He sounded normal, completely unfazed. That bastard. The only times he’s ever injured are the times _they_ were actively trying to injure him. Stiles wondered if he was well enough to kick Peter in the nuts. He bet he could do it. If not, he could totally talk Scott into it. That kind of thing was right up Scott’s alley.

“He’s next to me,” Stiles called out. “He seems to be unconscious, but he’s breathing. I’m a bit worried about his neck. It doesn’t look comfortable at all. Anyone got a twenty on Malia?”

“Malia’s fine, Stiles.” Malia sounded fine. She sounded pissed. He needed her to calm down. Yet more for him to deal with.

“You don’t sound fine, Malia. You sound less than fine. Talk to me.”

“I’m good. I should have seen them coming. I should have smelled them or something. I should have--”

“Not your job, Malia,” Allison interjected. “You were great. Don’t you worry about it. Come here and help me over to that stump, will you?”

God bless Allison. He could check Malia off his to-do list. She wouldn’t go off the deep end if she was focusing on Allison. Of course, if Malia was focusing on Allison, Allison wasn’t focusing on Isaac, which meant…

“Isaac,” Stiles called to the wolf, “could you come and help me with Derek? We need to figure out what happened. Scott, any update on Erica and Boyd? Unless they’ve shifted into another dimension, you should know something, there, buddy.”

Two hands positioned themselves under Stiles’s armpits, and Stiles braced for impact. The problem with surrounding himself with supernatural beings was that said supernatural beings often forgot that he was, in fact, only a normal human. This was going to hurt, and it was probably going to hurt at a level that Stiles was going to have to do something drastic to prevent from being noticeable. Isaac hauled him up and to his feet. Stiles bit down on his tongue to keep from making a sound as pain and heat shot from his right ankle to every single nerve in his body. His chest burned with the effort of increased breathing through the pain, and all he could taste was coppery blood. He swallowed and hoped that there was enough blood on the scene that none of the others picked up on it. There was enough going on. He didn’t need to add to anyone’s anxiety levels. 

“You okay, Stiles?” Isaac inquired. Stiles was actually kind of surprised that anyone actually asked. Normally Derek was the only one to ask him, probably out of duty, and Derek was currently down for the count. 

“I’m fine, man. Just worried about everyone else, you know? You sure you’re alright?”

“Yeah, I’m good. It’s fine.” Isaac walked over to Derek’s prone body and knelt down, quiet for a few seconds.

“Erica and Boyd will be okay,” Scott called out. “They’re a bit disoriented, but they’re already healing physically. We’re good over here!”

Stiles relaxed slightly. That was everyone present at the fight. He knew Derek was still breathing, and Derek was basically indestructible, anyway, so that was fine. Now he just needed to get himself home and patched up without his dad noticing, and everything would be golden. “Okay, so I’m going to leave you guys to clean up here. I’m gonna head home and get started researching what the hell just knocked us down. If you need me, text me.”

Everyone he could see nodded at him, so he turned and headed back in the direction of his Jeep. Putting weight on that ankle was basically a form of torture, but he had to make it look good in case anyone was actually looking. He doubted that was the case—he knew how to be convincing—but the wrong glance at the wrong time and they’d actually worry about him. 

He made it back to his Jeep, though he didn’t remember a whole lot about the trip outside of the blinding pain in his chest and ankle, and realized that he was going to have to drive on the ridiculous ankle before he could put a short end to the horrible night. He took a shallow breath in, doubled his resolve to end the trainwreck this day had been, and got in the car. 

He was lucky none of his dad’s deputies were hanging out on the roads he took home. _Erratic_ didn’t begin to describe his driving. Of course, it also didn’t begin to describe his pain levels, his oxygen levels, or his vision, either, so overall he felt like he still came out on top having made it home with both his Jeep and himself intact. His dad wasn’t home from work, so at least that had gone right. He hobbled into the house, taking his time and leaning on as much as he possibly could on his journey in, wincing with pain. Tears streamed from his eyes with every step. He got into the house and locked the front door, turning and staring up the stairs. God, could he not do this. His shoulders hunched forward in defeat, which actually made breathing slightly easier. His ankle wasn’t going to take it. There was no way. It had to be broken, and it was not getting any better with every step. 

He dwelled briefly on the idea that maybe he should’ve accepted the bite when Peter offered it, then knelt on the first step. His dad didn’t raise a quitter. He crawled up the steps on his hands and knees, his scraped palms burning against the carpet runner. He focused on the step in front of him, taking it one stair at a time until he reached the top. Then he figured that he was already on his hands and knees, so screw it. He stayed there, resting for just a minute. He’d go on in just a minute. He just needed to stay still for like a second or two, and then he’d crawl his way to the bathroom and figure out what he needed to do next. Resting wasn’t quitting. Resting was necessary. He closed his eyes and hung his head for a moment, letting go of his thoughts and relaxing at least a few of his tired, bruised muscles. 

~~~

Hands wrapped around his neck and hip, arms encircling one side of his body. The jostling was enough to flare the bruises, sprains, and whatever else was going on with him. He winced and hissed, his eyes still closed. He was laying on the floor, and now his hip hurt. He didn’t remember laying down, and didn’t want to think about why his hip hurt all of a sudden on top of everything else. 

“It’s alright, Stiles. It’s just me.” Derek’s voice was soft and soothing, and Stiles went with it. What the hell. This night was already one big nightmare. Why not add Derek I’m-indestructible-and-you’re-just-squishy Hale picking his broken body up off his hallway floor to the mix? Stiles groaned out something that he was pretty sure would pass as a consenting response and kept his eyes closed and his body limp because screw it. If Derek was going to pick him up and carry him around, Stiles was going to relax and let him for once. 

Sure enough, Derek picked him up and carried him forward and around a corner, setting him down on something squishier than him and comfortable—his bed. It had to be his bed. God bless Derek Hale.

Stiles opened his eyes. “You okay?”

Derek smiled down at him, his white teeth nearly blinding Stiles. That level of white was just not normal. It had to be a supernatural thing. Not only did they have crazy healing abilities, their teeth were insanely white. _Ugh._ “I’m fine, Stiles. All better. We should probably talk about you for a minute, though. You okay? And don’t lie to me.”

Stiles stared at the wall behind his alpha. “I’ll be fine. I just need to get patched up and get some sleep.”

“Bullshit.”

Stiles raised an eyebrow. “Was I lying, Mr. Lie Detector?”

“I didn’t say it was a lie. I said it was bullshit. Tell me what we need to patch. Try not to leave your ribs off of the list. Or the liquid in your lungs. Or your hip. Or that shoulder. Or whatever is filling the room with the stench of old blood.”

Ugh, wolves and their supernatural senses. “Fine. My ribs may be bruised--”

“Or cracked or broken, but whatever.”

“Or you could let me finish. My ribs may be _damaged_ , and my breathing might be slightly crispy, so that may need to get checked out. Whatever.”

Derek snorted and motioned with one hand for Stiles to continue.

“My hip seems to be bruised, which is new to me getting home, I swear. My shoulder is just sore to the touch and probably slightly bruised. I don’t think anything’s actually wrong with it. That stench of old blood is probably because I bit down on my tongue pretty hard. It was sort of disgusting, but it’s still totally attached at all points, so it’ll be fine. What I’m actually worried about is my ankle.”

Derek sat down on the bed beside him and patted his thigh. “Let me see it.”

Stiles propped his right leg up on Derek’s lap, and Derek pulled his pant leg up. “That shoe and sock have to come off, Stiles. It’s gonna hurt. I’m sorry in advance.”

Stiles nodded and bit down on his lip in advance of the pain. Derek popped a claw out. Stiles had just registered the change when he ripped an L shape along each side of Stiles’s shoe, both relieving the pressure on the sides of his ankle and creating more downward pressure. Stiles wasn’t sure which was worse, the pain when the shoe had been whole or the pressure of the top of the shoe against his foot. Derek took the shoe off in one swift motion, and the pain burned, but it was momentary. 

“I can cut the cloth of your sock away if you trust me. If you would rather I didn’t, I can pull it off.”

Stiles looked at his alpha. “I trust you. Do it.”

Derek held the sock up with one completely human hand and ran a single claw down one side of it. The thing must have been razor sharp, because it cut through the cloth like a paring knife through softened butter. It tickled against Stiles’s skin, but there was no pain, no sting of air on a cut. Derek removed the remnants of the sock and winced. “Yeah, that has to hurt.”

Stiles rolled his eyes, but didn’t look down at the ankle in question. “As a matter of fact, it does. I think it’s just severely sprained.”

Derek poked at Stiles’s ankle and Stiles nearly jumped out of his skin because of the sudden onslaught of pain. “Yeah, Stiles, I don’t think that’s just a sprain. I think you’ve broken it this time.”

“I can’t have broken it. You can’t just wrap an Ace bandage around a broken ankle and walk around school! It’s not broken.”

Derek looked at him, his face blank. “Is that really how you think life works?”

“I have been hanging around your furry ass for two years now. Of course I don’t really think that’s how life works. I just, you know, hope.”

Derek laughed. “Hoping isn’t going to set this ankle and bind it correctly. We’re going to have to do that—unless you want me to call Scott and have him get his mom--”

“Nope. No.” Stiles flailed to sit up abruptly and almost knocked himself off the bed. “We’re good here. We’re going to have to do that.”

Derek shook his head, that smug grin never leaving his face. “One of these days, Stiles, you’re going to trust the pack to take care of you properly.”

Stiles rolled his eyes and shook his head. “I’m trusting you, aren’t I? And it’s not that I don’t trust the pack—I trust them with my life. It’s just that they have more important things to worry about than me--”

Stiles felt the flash of pain race up his leg, but he didn’t have time to register why before Derek was actually hovering over him, pinning Stiles in with his arms and legs, his face a few inches from Stiles’s. Derek’s eyes roamed over Stiles’s face, searching for…something. Stiles didn’t know what. He apparently didn’t find it, though, because he frowned. “Is that what you think? Really? That you’re not important to us?”

Stiles just stared at him. Of course that’s what he thought. Because it was true. He was human. He had no supernatural abilities whatsoever. He couldn’t do anything to help them when things actually mattered. He couldn’t do anything to help himself when things actually mattered. Scott was wrapped up in Kira and Isaac and Allison and the realization that being a supernatural creature didn’t actually suck, and he barely had time for Stiles anymore. Erica and Boyd were always doing their thing, and that thing only included him when Erica forced the issue, really, and it was nice of her to do even that much. Lydia was awesome, but in fights and in pack matters she was kind of singularly focused, and that focus wasn’t on Stiles, which he really was actually okay with. Derek…Well, he’d always annoyed Derek. He knew Derek kept him around because he did his research for him. He knew he was Scott’s friend. This wasn’t news. It didn’t really affect him anymore. He just didn’t understand why Derek was bringing it up now. 

“Stiles? Tell me that’s not what you think.” Derek raised one of his hands, soothing his fingers along Stiles’s aching temple and along his jawline. “You have to know how much we value you, that we couldn’t function as a pack without you. I might be the alpha, but you’re the heart of this pack…You have the heart of this pack.”

Stiles snorted. He had no idea where this was coming from or what Derek was trying to accomplish, but he was over this. He shoved at Derek, trying to push the wolf off him. He’d had enough. 

Derek rolled to the side of the bed and Stiles struggled to sit up. Between his hip and his ankle, it wasn’t an overly easy feat to accomplish. Derek grabbed his forearm. “I need you to listen to me, Stiles. Why do you think I’ve been so worried about you? Why do you think I always come around and--”

Stiles cut him off, his voice low and even. “I’m aware of my role in the pack, Derek. Thank you. I’m the squishy human that everyone has to go out of their way to protect whether they want to or not. I’m research boy, the librarian, the friend of a beta. You are doing your duty as pack alpha making sure that I didn’t get myself seriously hurt working with you, and I really do appreciate that.”

Derek opened his mouth and Stiles held a finger up to stop him. “Still speaking. You came here tonight because you couldn’t do your duty in the forest. You’ve done it now; you should feel free to leave. Go check on your betas. I’m sure they’re okay by now, but they’ll probably still need you.”

Derek didn’t move, his hand still grasping Stiles’s forearm. “I came here tonight because nobody could say for sure that you were completely okay and I worry about you. I come here every time because I need to see you myself, because seeing you okay physically calms me. You are a squishy human. It’s true. But you’re _our_ squishy human. You’re _my_ squishy human, and you’ve proven yourself competent, capable, and fierce enough times that I’ve lost count. You’re the squishy human that we want to call when something goes down. You’re our librarian; we know without even thinking about it that you’re going to either know something about what’s going down or are in the process about finding out about it. We trust our lives in your knowledge and research. You’re a friend of a beta. You’re a friend of several betas. And a banshee. And a kitsune. And a coyote. And hunters. And an alpha. You’re my friend, Stiles. You’re my…You’re important. I’ll leave if you want me to, but there is no other member of my pack that needs me any more than you right now.”

Stiles stared down at the comforter under him and didn’t say anything in response. Just this once, he decided, he was going to go ahead and believe Derek. He was hurt enough that the comforting words were needed. 

“Let me take care of you tonight for a change, Stiles.”

Stiles nodded, and Derek smiled softly and leaned in, kissing his cheek in the barest brush of lips against skin. Stiles’s brain melted. That was…What was that?

“Lay back. I’ve got you from here out.” Stiles knew that Derek was going to be there through the night, but those words sounded like a different sort of promise to Stiles’s burning ears. He laid back. He hoped.

Derek took care of him, just like he’d promised.


End file.
